Latest News

Getting to know Steve16 March 2018
Steve – a strange shimmering ribbon of purple light in the night sky – was discovered in 2016, but now, thanks to ESA’s Swarm mission, more is known about this weird feature of the aurora.

Swarm trio becomes a quartet22 February 2018
With the aim of making the best possible use of existing satellites, ESA and Canada have made a deal that turns Swarm into a four-satellite mission to shed even more light on space weather and features such as the aurora borealis.

Wind satellite survives vacuum07 February 2018
ESA’s Aeolus satellite has been particularly tricky to build. One of the main stumbling blocks has been getting its lasers to work in a vacuum, but recent tests on the satellite show that the vacuum or temperature of space won’t get in the way of Aeol...

Forty years of Meteosat22 November 2017
ESA’s first Earth observation satellite was launched on 23 November 1977. When the first Meteosat satellite took its place in the sky, it completed coverage of the whole globe from geostationary orbit and laid the foundations for European and world co...

Shared vision strengthens Europe’s space strategy08 November 2017
Working together for three decades, ESA and Eumetsat have been instrumental in positioning Europe as a leader in observing Earth from space. Continuing to share a vision, the two organisations have signed a statement that will strengthen Europe in met...